What is netmon?

netmon is a Python-based network monitoring bot you run on your own macOS or Linux machine. It executes a single-threaded speed test every half hour using speedtest-cli and counts active LAN devices via nmap ARP scans. Results are kept in a local SQLite file. Every four hours the tool renders a matplotlib chart of the last 24 hours and ships a report with sarcastic AI commentary to Telegram or a Discord webhook. The LLM client works with any OpenAI-compatible endpoint, so you can point it at a local Ollama or LM Studio server. Setup relies on uv for Python and dependency management, plus system-installed nmap and speedtest-cli with passwordless sudo for nmap. The code is MIT-licensed.

Should you self-host netmon?

netmon scores 40/100 on selfhost.directory (how scoring works) and ranks #40 of 48 in Network Monitoring. It has 287 GitHub stars.

There was no stable release in the past 12 months, so check the repository's recent activity before you rely on it.

Setup is moderate: expect some configuration beyond a single command. It is MIT-licensed and written mostly in Python.

Its closest alternative on selfhost.directory is mitmproxy (86/100, 46 446 stars). It scores higher overall, so compare the two before you pick. See netmon vs mitmproxy side by side.